In Memory of Felicia Langer, the First Lawyer to Bring the Occupation to Court
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All people around the world and across time crave similar things. They want the chance to raise their families within a peaceful and fair environment. Also, one that affords a decent quality of life without fear of one’s fellow man. This was the main take away from our voyage into another world: Middle Eastern, Muslim, working class, rural and “occupied.” (If I am not for myself, who will be for me? But if I am only for myself, who am I? If not now, when?" ~ Hillel)
The Palestinian Authority led by Mahmoud Abbas in the occupied West Bank is intensifying its crackdown on Palestinians exercising their rights to free speech. Meanwhile politicians and activists in France are calling on their government to act on behalf of a Palestinian-French human rights defender arrested by Israel.
What I’m experiencing in this moment is a small example of how the occupation is used to take away agency from the Palestinian people on a daily basis. Each and every day, Palestinians are subjected to arbitrary checkpoints which delay their travel, restricted water which strips them of basic dignity, home demolitions which tear families apart, and constant surveillance that has seeped into every aspect of Palestinian society. I am broken but not finished.
Israel must cloak itself in sorrow over what happened since that terrible summer of 1967, when it won a war and lost nearly everything. Israel is to hold lavish celebrations over the coming weeks to mark the 50th anniversary of what it calls the “liberation of Judea, Samaria and the Golan Heights” – or what the rest of us describe as the birth of the occupation.
U.S. generosity, which costs every American taxpayers $300 a year, is detrimental to Israel and will only push it toward more acts of aggression. Hundreds of Israeli intellectuals appeal to world Jewry: `End Occupation for Israel's Sake'. Signatories of letter include seven high-ranking IDF officers, 20 former ambassadors, authors David Grossman, Amos Oz. As long as U.S. aid isn't in question, Israeli settlements are here to stay.
The defiant display of Palestinian flags in Glasgow last week by Scottish fans of the Celtic soccer team raised over $200,000 in donations online, all marked for two Palestinian charitable groups. Activist fans of Scotland's Celtics soccer team - the working-class, historically progressive community already facing punishment for flying Palestinian flags at a recent game against Israel to protest the Occupation - have launched the fundraiser.
This text describes the discourse on the Nakba - mostly the concept but also the historical event - in Israel. When did it appear? When did it decline and was repressed? What caused these changes? The attempt here is to describe historical moments, a periodization, from the founding of the state until today, in order to describe the relation to the term in each period and the changes it went through. Nakba Day - Solidarity actions across Ireland.
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